assuming the player unit is inside the head, the plug connections shouldn't matter unless the Y-B-5 wire is wrong. If you pull out the adjust plug for replay vs extra ball, does that make it stop? If you put the plug in replay, is it giving credits at wrong scores?

if credits are a problem also, are the snowshoe wipers on the player unit bridging rivets?

if yes, you need to adjust the the unit so the wipers are more-or-less centered on the rivets. I don't recall on that one whether you loosen and twist the contact plate or you adjust the step-up arm travel. If not sure, post a pic of the entire ratchet side of the unit.

also take a look at the contact plate on each score reel and check the wipers aren't bridging traces and there's no carbon track connecting traces.

with all the adjust plugs out, there should be no path back to the yellow wire, so a more analytical approach is to disconnect all the adjust plugs then stick a voltmeter with a probe on the black coil wire and the other probe poke the wires associated with the circuits between the adjust plugs and the 1000 point relay switch with the BLU-1 wire to see if you've got 24V ... but you many need to step the reels around to the previous digit (or any digit you know the unit will give an extra ball when the 1000 point relay powers).

also, since the circuits are "floating" (disconnected), you may see phantom voltage readings on the meter. Treat anything not 24V as zero for this purpose.

ok, good. If you really want to prove the issue is coming from the score reel circuit, you can stick paper between the contacts on the 1000 pt relay switch with the B-W-1 and BLU-1 wires. If extra balls/replays stops and all the adjust plugs are out, then you have a short into the stuff feeding the BLU-1 wire.

the coils in the game mostly have one side connected to the fused "hot" side of the transformer winding. The wire color is black at the fuse and changes to B-Y-WH-1 at a game over relay switch, then to R-Y-W and finally RED at other switches. When the game is reset, all the switches along the way should be closed so any of the wires will be the same as the black wire. However, to eliminate the switches when you care about a path to the yellow "common" wire, you can just stick a probe on the black wire on the fuse or any convenient coil that has the black wire on it - player unit step-up/reset coils both do, as well as all the score reel coils.

the other probe I'd start at with the blue and yellow marked wires in the circuit below. If you see 24V when probing any of them, I'd stick paper under all the wipers on the player unit and see what happens. That should tell you if the problem is on the player unit or coming from the score reels.

if it's hard to tell the wire colors on the player unit, the manual has a diagram.

given the behavior depends on the score, it probably a score reel issue and sticking paper under the wipers - really just need the wipers connecting rivets 34 to 35-38 on the diagram - will further isolate the circuit

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the red x's meant all those plugs are pulled out.

with the plugs out, you have a mystery because the 10K reels feeding into the player unit don't have any path anywhere else ... so you must have a short of some kind.

another thing you can try is sticking paper under the wipers on the 10K reels on players 2-4 and see if player 1 still has the issue.

nothing really makes sense, so you have to find something that should never happen like the switch stacks are twisted and a blade is touching the traces on a reel, a wire short someplace no-obvious, etc.

if disconnecting G-2 changes things, then G-2 is the problem.

the plug end of G-2 wasn't connect to anything, right? And if it was in a hole on the wood, there's nothing the plug can touch on either side?

is G-2 is shorted someplace along its length ... look where the wiring routes around unit frames to see if the frame edge has cut into the insulation - you can either find the problem, run a new wire or move one of the other wires you aren't using into G-2's spot on the reel and use that to get the score you want.

put a voltmeter on the G-2 end you disconnected and other probe on the black coil wire. If you get 24VAC, G-2 is shorted someplace.

for a G-2 adjust plug setting, the P2 unique part of the circuit is highlighted below. The adjust plug is kinda in the middle of the circuit, so if you set the P2 score reels to a score that should give an extra ball, you can use the voltmeter to quickly find the problem.

one meter probe on a black coil wire on any score reel coil, other probe poke the adjust plug wire appropriate for the score - G-2 in this example.

if you have 24V, the problem is in the yellow highlighted part of the circuit. If you don't, it's in the blue highlighed part of the circuit. You can move the probe around to find where the 24V drops. Possibilities are:
- player unit wiper<->rivet connections
- broken sphagetti wire on the back side of the player unit contact plate
- poor wiper connection on reel 2 contact plate
- broken off G-Y-2 or Y-O-1 wires

ideally you want to do this when the circuit is closed (current is flowing) as that will make cruddy connections show up as voltage drops. To close the circuit, you'd jumper the 1000 pt relay switch connecting BLU-1 to B-W-1 closed (switch not shown below).

if you didn't have a voltmeter handy, then jumping the 1K relay switch closed and using another jumper to jumper from W-O-5 to points in the blue or yellow highlight circuits will also find the problem. Easier to set the game to give credits, then when you get a credit with the jumper everything to the "right" of the jumped point is good and you keep working "left" until it doesn't give a credit. In practice, you poke easiest to get to places first and home in on the problem point.

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